Greetings All. i have been remiss from posting so here goes.
1. i do use the GAIA feet under my 3.7’s and i liked what they did as the speaker actually got a little richer sounding.
2. the 3.7’s do require some heavy duty amps and i use the PS Audio BHK 300 mono blocks, but even their stereo 250 amp did a great job when i had it.
3. I have been contemplating updating with new speakers and per Jafant’s urging, i will be sharing some of my findings here. My criteria for speakers would be that they would be USA made, and have dealers near me. Lucky for me there are two guys who have shops nearby and both are friends. one sells Wilson and i have listened to the Sabrina’s and the Sasha’s, and the other guy sells Magico and i have listened to the A5’s. Jafant warned me that i would have to spend some serious bucks to improve on the 3.7’s and he was correct. I liked a lot of what the Sabrinas did, but they lacked the openness and transparency of the 3.7s. on the other hand the Sasha’s were stunning but a bit more than i had planned to spend at $39K. Have heard the Magico A5 twice now and, like the Sabrinas, they did a lot I liked but i think the room they are in really holds them back as they are very close to the side walls. the owner said that he would bring them to my home in Jan. for a weekend audition. That would be the only way i can know how they really do. One of my complaints about the 3.7’s (and with all Thiel speakers going back to my first pair of 2.0’s in 1985) is that there can be an irritating glare when playing compact discs. So i recently got the new PS Audio DAC (I am a Beta tester) and the glare was reduced significantly. I asked Paul McGowan about that and here is his response:
The lower noise floor doesn’t net out in the way people might think (less audible noise). All the efforts at lowering noise by galvanically isolating everything removes jitter and that is almost always audible as glare. Also, the improved output transformer and output stages have a lot to do with the better sound.
The bottom line is that the Thiels are just ruthlessly revealing, and that why i heard the glare as it was a digital artifact. They sound a lot better now that I am using the new DAC. Will be selling my older PS DSD DAC if anyone is interested. Please PM if so. I will be listing it soon and will sell it to anyone on this thread for $2600 which is a great price. I am a big PS fan and use lots of their gear (except their BHK preamp).
to quote JA, "Happy Listening"
